If we really know everything that it is truly important to know about God–and if all that has been revealed, all that has been taught, all that has been said and sung about God has brought humanity to this, then what good has all of it been?
Yet if there is something new for us to learn, something more for us to understand about God, then it’s still possible for the human condition to change. Hope returns. Not hope for something better in the Hereafter, when life as we’ve known it on the earth has been destroyed, but hope for something better right here right now, before everything has been destroyed.
That hope cannot be realized, however, until some very important questions are asked and answered.
Is it true that humanity is utterly stubborn, completely unwilling and absolutely unable to overcome its most primitive instincts? Or is it possible that there is still some teaching left to be done, some data still missing, some important aspect of God and Life still not understood?
Could it be that the problem is not with the receivers of the information, but with the information itself?
Could it be that humanity’s understanding of God and of Life is not so much "wrong" as it is simply incomplete?
Finally, is it time for humanity to throw open the door to inquiry about God in a new way?
For far too long the world’s discussion about God has been moving in only one direction, led in the main by those who say that we understand all there is that’s really important for us to understand about God, and who assert that humanity’s problems are not caused by human beings who fail to understand, but by human beings who fail to act on their understanding.
This is a popular notion, but it’s a misconception. Just the opposite has been true. It has been people who did act on what they understood about God who have caused many of our biggest problems.
These are people who thought they knew What God Wants.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who created the 200 years of the Christian Crusades and the horrors of the Inquisition, seeking to win the world for Christianity.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who told armies of Muslims to send marauders far and wide to conquer every land and culture and bring it under the Nation of Islam.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who called themselves the Chosen People and reclaimed land they declared to be originally their own, ignoring the fact that history had caused it to be inhabited for thousands of years by others, and telling those others to now leave portions of that land, and to live when and how they are told to live, as second class citizens without equal rights in their own home.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who hanged men and women in town squares, and burned others at the stake, holding up the Good Book and declaring them to be witches.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who passed laws making it illegal for humans of differing races to marry, or for consenting adults to engage in certain sexual practices.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who created cultural prohibitions forbidding people to sing or dance, draw pictures of any person, or play music of any kind except sacred songs.
It’s people who thought they knew What God Wants who said that it was not okay to even utter or write the name of G-D–but that it was okay to kill in G-D’s name.
Is all of this really What God Wants?
Are you sure?
It is important to be sure, because we are not talking about a small thing here.
*Neale Donald Walsh
Dr. Richard Beck, over at "Experimental Theology", has written an outstanding post on "community". This is the over-used phrase currently coming from both inside and outside the institution. It’s the June 28th post. It is well-worth a read.
On this day of your life, dear friend, I believe God wants you to know…….that impatience will get you nowhere, fast.
If you insist on being in a hurry, you’ll move very quickly — and often get nowhere. Take a breath… Relax…. Find your peace. Don’t require the Universe to move more rapidly than it is. It is actually working perfectly, and it will prove that to you if you will give it a chance.
*I wanted to share with you this word from Neale Donald Walsh
Ξ June 27th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Life |
It is amazing when you look at everything that happens in your life as part of a perfect plan, how it changes your perception of those events. "When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change." What an absolutely true statement!
It is not our outer circumstances that determine whether or not we are happy or sad. Rather, it is our inner decisions about how we choose to experience those circumstances.
Ξ June 24th, 2008 | → 2 Comments | ∇ Life |
Many of you have heard me say in my posts that I don’t believe in accidents or coincidences. Friday, As I was climbing up the folding stairway into my attic, I lost my balance and tumbled back off the ladder four feet down onto the ceramic tile floor of the utility room. I landed on my left leg. It wasn’t pretty. My heel and leg were hurting. Since it was Friday afternoon, I chose to wait and see how I felt the next morning. Saturday morning I got up and tried the leg. Not so good.! I decided to go to a local "doc in the box" because I truly dislike emergency rooms. After a series of X-rays, I found that I had, according to the doctor, several minor fractures and a dislocation of the ankle. I was put in a fracture boot; chided to stay off the leg and foot, and told to see a Orthopedist ASAP. My appointment is today at 1:30PM. I’m hoping the doctor read the X-rays wrong.
I got to thinking that this was not the time for this to happen. My wife had come home for a few days vacation and now she waiting on me. It was her vacation and I had really messed it up. I had several things going on now in my life that required my focused attention and here I was laid up on the couch. I don’t relish having to spend time at home on the couch or in a chair. I have things that need to be done. Things that can’t wait! Regular everyday things that someone with two good legs has no problem doing. I was pretty depressed, really feeling sorry for myself. Then, on Monday afternoon, my wife’s best friend stopped by to visit with her and after a few minutes of conversation with me, listening to my whining, she said,"why don’t you use this as an opportunity to catch up on your reading (something I’ve let slip lately). And you’ve got the whole internet!" The internet, that vast storehouse of information for perusal, study, and acquisition of information.
She was absolutely right! What was I thinking? Obviously, I wasn’t. I cannot change what happened. All I can control is how I react to what happened. I can whine, and fret about all the "things" that need to be done…….or…….I can use this time as an opportunity given to me to help further find out who I really am; to find more about our Source; to continue my quest to live a happy useful, loving life. I choose to view this as an opportunity.
UPDATE: I have a bone chip on the end of the tibia where it meets the ankle. The doctor put me in a large fracture boot. I will be back at work on Monday, the 30th. I am very fortunate that the damage was limited. Gotta be more careful!
Ξ June 22nd, 2008 | → 6 Comments | ∇ Life |
*Just about a year ago, I put this post together. I decided to re-post it here for anyone who missed it.
We tend to speak as if we really knew what God is and really understood how God works. In fact, to speak of “God” is just to express a basic, optimistic belief, namely, that there is a good and loving power behind the universe and in one way or another this power is working through everything.
This belief is certainly correct, but we imagine that power as if we were still five years old. When we speak of God, we tend to imagine some mighty miracle worker in the sky who steps in every so often and makes things turn out okay, just as Mommy or Daddy used to “miraculously” appear to catch us when we were about to fall. But, that image is just infantile, magical thinking. It is not an authenic belief in God. Someone told me one time that there are only three things you need to know about God: 1) God exists; 2) you are not God; and 3) God is not Santa Claus.
God set up the laws of the universe on the basis of probabilities. These probabilities are built into the ordinary functioning of the universe. The laws of physics, chemistry, biology, and psychology, as far as we know them or can know them, formulate the probabilistic regularities that we have so far discovered. But God is the author of these laws. God set up the universe as it is. God is the one who decided that things should unfold in this probabilistic way. This point is important, so it should be stated more accurately: Whatever it is that set up the universe, this we call GOD.
I say that this is a more accurate way of stating the matter because we really do not know what “God” is. “God” is only the name we give to whatever (or whoever) it is that explains the universe. We really do not understand the ultimate explanation of the universe. We imagine GOD to be a person- a HE or SHE- somebody to whom we can relate, but what could it actually mean to say that God is a person? If God is the Force behind all things, then it certainly does not seem very personal. Nonetheless, if this Force is behind all things, It must be intelligent and freely acting, and, if so, It must be a person, someone who set the whole thing in motion and keeps it in existence.
The best we can do is say that “God” is a word we use to name the ultimate explanation of all things. We know that “God” exists, but we really cannot comprehend Him/Her/It. Putting the name “God” on Him/Her/It should not delude us into thinking that we know what we are talking about. To believe in God is to believe in something that surely must be there- all reason points that way- but believing in God is to believe in something that we really do not understand.
“God is a mystery”. Ever heard that before? I suspect that few religious leaders really understand the mysteriousness of God. So, they turn it into a club and beat people over the head with it. God’s mysteriousness becomes an excuse for whatever they want to proclaim. In the name of God they preach things that are unreasonable, unrealistic, and even silly. They buffalo people by appealing to a God who is beyond understanding. In the face of the unknown, they scare people into obedience by threatening them with the fires of Hell. In this way they maintain control over the masses.
Nonetheless, to affirm a God who challenges our understanding is a reasonable thing to do. There certainly must be some power behind the universe that we know, and we certainly do not understand what that power is.*
*from, “The Transcended Christian“, by Daniel Helminiak
Ξ June 19th, 2008 | → 5 Comments | ∇ Life |
God has freely granted liberty through Christ. Not by what one does with Christ. But through Christ. That’s a huge distinction.
Kevin Beck at "Transmillenial"
Gregg Braden’s latest offering seems to prove that it makes perfect sense that to change our lives we need to change what we believe about ourselves and our world. For more than 20 years, Gregg Braden, a former senior aerospace computer systems designer, has searched for the understanding to do just that. From the remote monasteries of Egypt, Peru and Tibet, to the forgotten texts that were hidden by the early Christian Church, the secret of healing our false beliefs was left in the coded language of our most cherished traditions. It is verified in today’s science.
Gregg is a New York Times Best selling author, scientist and visionary and has been a featured guest for international conferences, and media specials, exploring the role of spirituality in technology. A former Senior Computer Systems Designer for Martin Marietta Aerospace and The Technical Operations Supervisor for Cisco System Braden is now considered a leading authority on bridging the wisdom of our past with the science and peace of our future.
Could the spontaneous healing of disease, living to advanced ages, an instant connection with everyone and everything, and even time travel be our true heritage in the universe? New discoveries suggest that the answer to questions such as these may be a resounding “Yes!” The key to unleashing such miracles lies in the new discoveries of physics and biology, and the missing link that connects them with our lives!
We tend to live our lives based in what we believe about our world, ourselves, our capabilities, and our limits. With few exceptions, those beliefs come from what science, history, religion, and other people tell us. Historically, we have been taught that we are an evolutionary “accident” — passive observers in the universe, experiencing a brief moment in time with little effect during our stay.
What if those beliefs are wrong? What if we are only limited until we change the way we see ourselves in the world? How differently would we live if we discovered that we are born with the power to choose our relationship to longevity, health, and even life itself? Such a radical discovery would change everything about the way we see ourselves! It is also precisely what the leading-edge discoveries of our day are showing us. In the first years of the 21st Century, new discoveries offer the paradigm-shattering revelations that demonstrate how:
- We are not limited by the laws of physics, as we know them today!
- We are not limited by the laws of biology, as we know them today
- The DNA of life is a code that may be changed by choice!
The implications of these discoveries are vast, powerful, and to some, even a little frightening. They show us that beyond reasonable doubt, we are capable of changing the course of our lives, our world, and even altering reality, if we choose. It is these seemingly miraculous abilities that make it possible for us to heal from cancer and the suffering of AIDS, experience extended life spans, create life-affirming joy and abundance, and much more.
In 1944, Max Planck, the father of quantum theory, shocked the world by saying that there is a “matrix” of energy that provides the blueprint for our physical world. It is this place of pure energy where everything from the birth of stars and the DNA of life, to our deepest relationships, the peace between nations and our personal healing begins. The experimental proof that Planck’s matrix—The Divine Matrix—is real, now provides the missing link that bridges our spiritual experiences of imagination, prayer and belief with the miracles that we see in the world around us. Whether you call that "matrix" God, the Source, or something else, this book provides an intriguing look at future possibilities inherent in every human being.
Through the connection that joins all things, scientists have shown that the “stuff” that the universe is made of—waves and particles of energy—responds and conforms to the expectations, judgments and beliefs that we create about our world. In a world where an intelligent field of energy (God) connects everything from global peace to personal healing, what may have sounded like fantasy and miracles in the past suddenly becomes possible in our lives. There is one small catch, however. Our power to change our bodies and our world is dormant until we awaken it.
The key to awakening such an awesome power is that have to make a small shift in the way we see ourselves in the universe. We must see ourselves as a part of everything, rather than separate from everything. Beyond merely thinking of ourselves from this unified view, we must feel ourselves as part of all that we experience. With this one little shift in perception we are given access to the most powerful force in the universe, and the key to address even the seemingly impossible situations in our lives.
With this connection in mind, we must begin to think of the way we relate to life, our families, and even our casual acquaintances from a powerful new perspective. Good, bad, right, or wrong, everything from the lightest of the light and most beautiful life experiences to the most horrible occasions of human suffering can no longer be written off as chance happenings. Clearly, the key to healing, peace, abundance, and the creation of experiences, careers, and relationships that bring us joy is to understand just how deeply we are connected to everything in our reality. And our understandings are based in our beliefs.
It makes perfect sense that to change our lives we need to change what we believe about ourselves and our world.
This book is well worth your time, especially if you’ve read, "The Divine Matrix", and even if this is your first venture into the mind of Gregg Braden.
Ξ June 16th, 2008 | → 1 Comments | ∇ Life |
In these times, when so many decisions that you must make seem so very important, for once in your life, trust your heart. Trust how you feel about it. For most of our lives, we have been taught NOT to trust our feelings (heart). This is the lie. Our hearts ARE the center of our emotions. And, how we feel about something in our hearts is our truth. TRUST YOUR HEART………..
Ξ June 10th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Life |
UPDATE: A photograph of the the church sign now accompanies the post of June 4th. Thanks to my son Jeff.
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